Suzanne Brigit Bird (born October 16, 1980) is an American former basketball player who played professionally for 20 years in the United States and Russia. She played her entire Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) career with the Seattle Storm. Bird was drafted with the first overall pick by the Storm in the 2002 WNBA draft and is considered one of the greatest players in WNBA history. As of 2025, Bird is the only WNBA player to win titles in three different decades. In 2025 she was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame and the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, and in 2026 she was inducted into the NYC Basketball Hall of Fame and the FIBA Hall of Fame. In addition to her WNBA career, Bird played for 10 seasons in the Russian Premier League for Dynamo Moscow, Spartak Moscow Region and UMMC Ekaterinburg, winning 5 Premier League championships (2007, 2008, 2012–2014) and five EuroLeague Women championships (2007–2010, 2013).
In high school, Bird was the New York State Player of the Year, the New York Daily News Player of the Year, and a WBCA All-American. In her senior year on the undefeated University of Connecticut (UConn) team in 2002, she won the Wade Trophy and the Naismith Award as College Player of the Year. She finished her UConn career ranked first in three-point field goal percentage and free throw percentage, and second in assists and steals. She won the Nancy Lieberman Award three times as the top point guard in the nation. During her UConn career, Bird had a record of 114–4.
Bird has won a joint-record four WNBA championships with the Storm (2004, 2010, 2018, 2020), five Olympic gold medals (2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020), two NCAA Championships with UConn (2000, 2002), and four FIBA World Cups (2002, 2010, 2014, 2018). She is one of only 11 women to attain all four accolades, and is one of only two basketball players—of any gender—to win five Olympic gold medals.
During Bird's WNBA career, she was selected to thirteen WNBA All-Star teams and eight All-WNBA teams. She was voted by fans as one of the WNBA's Top 15 Players of All Time in 2011, was voted into the WNBA Top 20@20 as one of the league's top 20 players of all time in 2016, and was voted into The W25 as one of the league's top 25 players of all time in 2021. Bird retired from professional basketball after the 2022 WNBA season.
Early life Bird was born on October 16, 1980, in Syosset, New York, on Long Island, to Herschel and Nancy Bird. Her father's ancestry is Russian-Jewish. She has an older sister named Jen. In the 1900s, Bird's paternal grandparents immigrated to the United States from what later became Ukraine. After arriving, their last name was changed from "Boorda" to "Bird".
Bird was interested in sports from an early age, partly influenced by her athletic older sister. In addition to basketball, she played soccer and tennis and ran track. Her fifth grade yearbook lists her potential future careers as a lawyer, doctor, and professional soccer player. Bird started playing Amateur Athletic Union basketball in the sixth grade, and soon after began receiving college recruiting letters. At the age of 11, she played during halftime at a St. John's University basketball game. Her play was so impressive that a security guard asked for her autograph.
High school career Bird played her freshman and sophomore years at Syosset High School, but wanted more competition. She enrolled at Christ the King Regional High School in Queens, New York, where she played on the Lady Royals team for two seasons. During Bird's junior year, the team's record was 24–3. During her senior year the Royals went undefeated, winning the New York state championship and the national title. Bird won the New York State Player of the Year award and the New York Daily News Player of the Year award, and was named a WBCA All-American. She played in the WBCA High School All-America Game, scoring 11 points.
College career Bird was recruited by several university teams, including those of Stanford, Vanderbilt and University of Connecticut (UConn). She leaned toward selecting the UConn Huskies, partly because the UConn campus was close to her home, but hesitated when two point guards announced their commitments to the team. After one of the point guards withdrew, Bird decided to accept UConn's offer.Goldberg p 10–11 Eight games into her freshman season, Bird suffered a torn ACL. Since she had played more than 20% of the team's games in the 1998–1999 season, she was not able to redshirt. During her sophomore season (1999–2000), she returned to lead the team to a 36–1 record, the Big East Championship, and the 2000 NCAA Division I championship. In her junior season (2000–2001), the Huskies went 32–3. In her senior season (2001–2002), the Huskies went 39–0, with Bird winning the Wade Trophy, the Honda Sports Award and the Naismith Award as College Player of the Year. During her junior year, Bird played in a game against Notre Dame which sportswriter Jeff Goldberg referred to as "the best women's basketball game ever played". He memorialized the game in his book Bird at the Buzzer, whose title refers to Bird's game-winning shot at the buzzer.
As of 2024, Bird ranks No. 39 on the list of UConn players to score 1,000 career points, with 1,378 points. She is No. 7 in career assists with 585. She ranks number 1 in three-point field goal percentage (45.9) and free throw percentage (89.2). During her career with the Huskies, she won two NCAA National Championships and three Big East Championships. In 2000, Bird was the first winner of the Nancy Lieberman Award, which is given to the top Division I point guard in the nation; she won it again in 2001 and 2002. Her record at UConn in games she played is 114–4. Bird was a member of the 2006 inaugural class of inductees to the University of Connecticut women's basketball "Huskies of Honor" recognition program.
Professional career
WNBA
The Seattle Storm selected Bird with the first overall pick of the 2002 WNBA draft. She would play alongside superstar Lauren Jackson who was also drafted first overall the year before. In her rookie season, Bird started all 32 games for the Storm and averaged 14.4 ppg. She was selected as a starter on the 2002 WNBA Western Conference All-Star team. Bird was the runner-up for the Rookie of the Year award and one of only two rookies to make the All-WNBA First Team. Both Bird and Jackson led the Storm to their first playoff appearance. During her first year in the league, Bird scored a career-high 33 points in a regular-season game against the Portland Fire. From 2002 (rookie season) to 2022 (retirement), she made a record 13 appearances playing in the Western Conference All-Star team.
In 2004, the Storm acquired shooting guard Betty Lennox in a dispersal draft, joining Bird and Lauren Jackson to form a dominant trio of star players that helped lead the Storm to its first WNBA Championship. With the WNBA Championship win, Bird became one of 11 women to receive an Olympic gold medal, an NCAA Championship, Fiba World Cup gold, and a WNBA Championship. The others are Sheryl Swoopes, Cynthia Cooper-Dyke, Tamika Catchings, Brittney Griner and fellow Huskies Swin Cash, Kara Wolters, Diana Taurasi, Maya Moore, Breanna Stewart, and Asjha Jones.
En route to the Storm's second championship, Bird had one of the most clutch moments in WNBA Playoff history; during the Conference Finals against the championship-defending Phoenix Mercury with the Storm up 1–0 in the series, Bird hit a game-winning three-pointer with two seconds left in Game 2 to put the Storm up 91–88, after erasing a 19-point deficit to advance to the 2010 WNBA Finals. Also in Game 1 of the 2010 WNBA Finals, Bird hit a game-winning jump shot with 2 seconds left to put the Storm up 79–77 and would later sweep the series. In 2011, she was voted one of the WNBA's Top 15 Players of All Time by current players and coaches, the media, and fans on the WNBA website.
During the 2012 WNBA season, Bird experienced knee problems, yet she managed to play 29 games throughout the regular season and the playoffs. In the off-season, Bird had knee surgery, which would prevent her from playing the entire 2013 season.
Bird returned for the 2014 WNBA season. That year, she played 33 games, averaged 10.6 ppg and 4.0 apg, and was voted as a WNBA all-star. However, the Storm did not make it to the 2014 playoffs and would also fail to do so the following year.
On February 16, 2016, Bird re-signed with the Storm to a multi-year deal in free agency.
In the 2016 season, Bird would have a resurgence, putting up her best numbers since coming back from knee surgery. She averaged 12.8 ppg while shooting a career-high in 3-point field goal percentage and led the league in assists with 5.8 apg. For the fifth time in her career and the first time in 12 years, Bird was named to the All-WNBA First Team. Prior to the season, the Storm selected Breanna Stewart first overall in the 2016 WNBA draft, their second number one overall pick in a row after drafting Jewell Loyd the year before. With the addition of Stewart and Loyd quickly developing into a star player, the Storm made it back to the playoffs for the first time in 3 years with a 16–18 record. With the WNBA's new playoff format in effect, the Storm were the number 7 seed in the league and faced the Atlanta Dream in the first round, losing the single elimination game 94–85. Bird was also listed in the WNBA Top 20@20, a list of the league's best 20 players ever in celebration of the WNBA's twentieth anniversary.
In April 2017, Bird underwent left knee surgery, which caused her to miss training camp. However, she returned on May 21, 2017, following her recovery and made her season debut, making her both the oldest active player and starter in the WNBA.Sue Bird is gay, not that it matters to progressive WNBA, fans She scored 9 points and 10 assists in an 81–71 victory over the Washington Mystics. On June 11, 2017, Bird scored a season-high 21 points and 10 assists in a 94–86 loss to the New York Liberty. She was voted into the 2017 WNBA All-Star Game, making it her 10th all-star game appearance (tying Tamika Catchings for most all-star game appearances). Bird had set the All-Star Game record for assists with a performance of 8 points and 11 assists for the Western Conference All-Stars team in a 130–121 victory. On September 1, 2017, Bird became the WNBA all-time leader in assists with a career total of 2,600 assists, passing Ticha Penicheiro in a 110–106 overtime loss to the Washington Mystics. She finished the game with 19 points and a season-high 13 assists. Bird would finish off the 2017 season, averaging a career-high in assists per game as the Storm finished 14–19 with the 8th seed in the league. The Storm would lose 79–69 to the Phoenix Mercury in the first-round elimination game.